France's Total has completed the deepening of the Absheron gas condensate field production well, but first gas is not expected before mid-2021 from the early development programme at the Azerbaijan Caspian Sea project.

“The well was drilled to 6803 metres, the five-inch production liner lowered in it and the tie-back string was put in place. Now the operator has started well completion”, sources familiar with the development said.

The overall well completion is expected to be finished in November.

The sole ABD-001 production well is located in a water depth of around 470 metres and will pump produced gas and condensate via subsea flowlines to a small platform in shallow waters.

However, sources said that other components of the early production scheme have yet to be completed.

Fabrication of the platform has started at a shipyard near Baku, operator sources said.

The platform will be installed in shallow waters in the vicinity of state oil company Socar’s Oil Rocks offshore facility.

Meanwhile, Total expects to start installing a flowline as part of the development in the fourth quarter of 2019.

“As for subsea production facilities, fabrication of equipment is ongoing and we plan to start laying the flowline in the fourth quarter and the umbilical in the second quarter of 2020. Fabrication of the platform to be installed at Oil Rocks field has started,” sources added.

However, the timing depends on the availability of the Saipem pipelay vessel Israfil Huseynov, which is reportedly awaiting repair after a fatal accident in May that claimed one life.

“The vessel is under technical inspection right now... the repair has not started yet,” Upstream was told.

Saipem said after the accident that the repair work would take two months to complete.

However, according to other estimates, it will require at least four months to put the pipelaying barge back into service.

Total originally targeted first gas from the Absheron early production scheme next year, but 2021 is now seen as more likely.

Total will be responsible for the subsea installations and Socar will build the platform where the gas and condensate will be gathered before being moved to its Oil Rocks complex.

The EPS is being designed to produce 4.3 million cubic metres per day of gas and 12,000 barrels per day of condensate.

Produced gas will be sold to Socar for domestic use in Azerbaijan.

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Start-up at Absheron delayed till mid-2021